How To Add Charts And Graphs To WordPress

You’ve heard the old saying “a picture is worth a thousand words.” This certainly applies when you’re trying to present or explain complex data.

Graphs and charts are a great way to make data easier to grasp.

You can present data using tables, but if you want your audience to try and make sense of complex data with numbers, trends or relationships easily, then graphs and charts are perfect for helping them visualize the information.

Graphs and charts help you present complex data so your audience can more easily understand it!

If you need to present dynamic visual content on your WordPress site using graphs and charts, this step-by-step tutorial will show you how to create great-looking and updateable charts to your WordPress pages and posts that:

• Your site visitors can interact with
• Lets you upload data from your hard drive or an online source of data
• Will dynamically resize for mobile viewing

If you plan to display visual data like pie charts, comparison graphs or trending graphs that contain static information (e.g. historical data), a simple method you can use to add this information is to create your graphs or charts using a desktop application, convert these into jpg or png files and then simply add your image files to your content.

Use WordPress Chart & Graph Plugins

If you want to create interactive bar charts and pie graphs in your WordPress posts and pages with no coding skills required, the easiest way to do this is to use a plugin.

Fortunately, there is a great plugin for WordPress users that is simple to install, easy-to-use and allows you to not only create stunning and interactive charts and graphs, it also lets you populate your charts and graphs with updateable information.

Visualizer Plugin For WordPress

Visualizer Plugin URL

You can install the plugin inside your WP dashboard (we explain how to do this a little further below), or download Visualizer the WP free plugin repository using the link below:

http://wordpress.org/plugins/visualizer

Visualizer Description

WordPress Visualizer is a simple, easy to use and powerful plugin for WordPress that lets you create, manage and embed stunning and dynamic charts into your WordPress posts and pages with just a few mouse clicks.

Visualizer uses Google Visualization API to render charts, which support cross-browser compatibility (adopting VML for older IE versions) and cross-platform portability to iOS and new Android releases, and are based on pure HTML5/SVG technology (adopting VML for old IE versions), so no extra add-ons are required.

WordPress Visualizer also provides a variety of built-in optimized for all your data visualization needs, including:

• Line chart
• Area chart
• Bar chart
• Column chart
• Pie chart
• Geo chart
• Gauge chart
• Candlestick chart
• Scatter chart

The plugin is also flexible and customizable, allowing you to use Google Chart Tools with their default setting, or configure an extensive set of options to match your site’s design. A number of options are available for each chart that let you further customize their look and feel.

Additionally, charts are rendered using HTML5/SVG technology to provide cross-browser compatibility (including VML for older IE versions) and cross-platform portability to iPhones, iPads and Android devices. Your web visitors can see your charts and graphs on their mobile web browsers without having to install any extra plugins.

How To Install WordPress Visualizer

Inside your WP administration area, select Plugins > Add New from the main sidebar menu …

In the Add Plugins screen type search for “visualizer” and click enter …

Locate Visualizer in the search results screen and click the “Install Now” button …

Click OK to go ahead …

Activate the plugin …

You can also activate the plugin in the Plugins section …

After the plugin has been activated, click on Library …

You can get to the plugin’s ‘library’ screen by choosing Media > Visualizer Library in the main menu …

This brings up the plugin’s Visualizer Library settings …

After installing the plugin, the library contains no charts.

The next step is to add the charts and graphs to your library that you plan to display in your pages and posts.

How To Configure The Visualizer Plugin

To add a graph or chart to the Visualizer library, click on ‘Add New’ …

A gallery displaying all the types of charts available will come up on your screen.

Select the chart or graph type you would like to create and click on the ‘Next’ button …

The selected graph/chart type will pop up in a lightbox.

The next step is to upload a CSV file with all the data you would like to populate your chart or graph with …

When creating your CSV data file, ensure that:

• The first row includes the column headings.
• The second row contains the series type (e.g. number, timeofday, etc.)

The screenshot below shows how to format your data correctly …

If you are not sure how to format your CSV file, just download the sample provided with the plugin.

Once you have completed this step, select the data source (‘From Computer’ or ‘From Web’) in the ‘Upload CSV File’ section.

Upload CSV File From Computer

To upload a CSV file and data from your hard drive select ‘From Computer‘ …

Use the browser to locate and select your file and then click on ‘Open‘ …

The plugin imports your data and displays it using the graph/chart type you have selected …

Upload CSV File From The Web

For a step-by-step tutorial that explains how to create, save and publish data to a Visualizer chart or graph using Google Spreadsheet, go here:

• How To Populate Data Using Google Spreadsheet

After importing the data, make sure that all of the information is correct (if not, click on the ‘Back’ button and reupload a data file containing the correct data), and then click ‘Next‘ …

Depending on the chart or graph type you’ve selected, the plugin displays a range of customization settings and options …

Visualizer gives you complete control of your chart or graph, and updates your display in real time …

For example, the pie chart offers various configurable options, such as:

• General Settings – Configure settings for the chart’s title, font styles, tooltip, and legend.
• Pie Settings – Create 3D pie charts, draw slices counterclockwise, set the text content displayed on the slice, create a “donut” pie chart, rotate the chart’s “start” angle and set the slice border color.
• Residue Settings – Set the ‘Visibility Threshold’ (the slice relative part, below which a slice will not show individually.), ‘Residual Slice Label’ (the label for the combination slice that holds all slices below slice visibility threshold, e.g. “Other”), and ‘Residue Slice Color’.
• Slice Settings – Customize the ‘Slice Offset’ (how far to separate the slice from the rest of the pie), and ‘Slice Color’.
• Layout & Chart Area – Configure the layout (total size of chart) including the width and height of the chart as a number of percentage, background color for the main area of the chart and the chart border width and color, and the placement and size of the chart area (where the chart itself is drawn, excluding axis and legends).

Once you are satisfied with the way your graph or chart is looking, click Create Chart …

The new graph or chart will now be added to the ‘Visualizer Library’ section …

Note that new visual elements are given a unique ID displayed in a shortcode. As you will see very soon, this allows you to insert charts and graphs into your pages and posts very quickly …

Charts and graphs added to the Visualizer Library can be accessed by type …

After adding a graph or chart to the ‘Visualizer Library’, you can edit its details, duplicate it, or trash it …

Visualizer Usage

After you’ve created a new chart or graph and added it to the Visualizer Library, it’s really very simple to add it to a page or post.

First, create a new post or page (or open an existing one) …

Next, place your mouse cursor where you want to insert your visual element into the content and click on Add Media …

Click on ‘Visualizations‘ …

Select the element to be inserted into your content and click on the “insert” icon …

This will add a shortcode for the element into your content …

Once you have added your visual element, click on Publish to publish (or update) your content …

Once your page has been published, click ‘View post’ to see the end result …

You will see the graph in where you placed the shortcode …

As mentioned earlier, the plugin also displays responsive charts for mobile device users …

As you can see, the Visualizer plugin lets you insert and customize dynamic charts and graphs in your content. You can change your data and your changes will automatically be reflected wherever you have inserted your charts, graphs, comparison bars , etc. in your website. This is great if you’re managing dynamic chart data in WordPress.

The developers of this plugin have created a number of step-by-step tutorials you can use to learn how to edit, customize and use the plugin.

For additional tutorials on editing, cloning, deleting and adding data to your charts, visit the website below:

• WordPress Visualizer – Additional Tutorials

Congratulations! Now you know how to insert interactive bar charts and graphs into WordPress.

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